Related Papers
Can we Give God a Name? Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth’s Teaching on Analogy
2014 •
Mariusz Tabaczek
One of the most famous controversies in the scholarly circles of Catholicism and Protestantism is the opposition between Aquinas’ analogia entis and Barth’s analogia fidei. Considered, paradoxically, in the second half of the last century, as a possible opening for the ecumenical dialogue (Mondin, Chavannes), it was summoned more recently in some important publications by Johnston, McCormack, Spencer, and White. The main goal of this article is to offer a general account of the Aquinas-Barth controversy, its philosophical and historical background, and an evaluation of the argumentation concerning ways of convergence and divergence between the proponents of analogia entis and analogia fidei, in the context of the possible reconciliation between Aquinas’ and Barth’s positions.
Heythrop Journal-a Quarterly Review of Philosophy and Theology
THE ONTOLOGY OF ANALOGY IN AQUINAS: A RESPONSE TO LAURENCE HEMMING
2009 •
Victor Salas
Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies
The Theological Significance of Analogy Language in the Teaching of the Syriac Fathers and its Impact on Theology of Today
2020 •
Mateusz Rafał Potoczny
Like any other science, theology has a specific language, which should express and clarify its essentials. Because most of the subjects of theological research are immeasurable, scientific language has to operate using images and theoretical terms. Of course, there are many methodologies of theological discourse. Among them one can find the methodology developed by Church Fathers especially those belonging to both West and East Syriac Traditions. Since their mentality was close to the Semitic roots, they started to use in the theological treatises a very specific kind of explanation which could be well understood by the people of Middle East. It was a language of analogy. Thanks to the use of tangible images the Fathers invented a direct language which enabled them to explain truths that could not be clarified using ordinary language. In this paper we try to explain the importance of analogy in theological debate. The explanation will be supported by some examples taken from the writings of the prominent Syriac Fathers regarding the baptismal analogies and the typology "Mary-Eve", seen as an example of the theological explanation of the divine truth. In the final part of this study, we attempt to outline the accommodation of analogical language to contemporary theological discussion and liturgical practice.
Analogia Entis and Theological Hermeneutics
J. P. Manoussakis
Plenary address at the international theological conference "The Knowledge of God: East and West" organized by the Ukrainian Catholic University, Lviv, Ukraine on October 9, 2014.
Doctor Communis
Analogy and Scripture
2023 •
Jörgen Vijgen
[with Piotr Roszak] ‘Analogy and Scripture’, in: San Tommaso e l’analogia, a cura di S.-T. Bonino, G. Mazzotta e L. Tuninetti, Roma: Urbaniana University Press, 2023, 49-78 (Doctor communis N.S. 5).
Reflecting the Mystery: Analogy Beyond Negation and Affirmation
Robert F Fortuin
According to the Nicaean Fathers there exists a division between the uncreated and created order of existence which is referred to as the ‘ultimate division of being.’ This profound disproportion of dissimilarity is marked by the infinite, absolute existence of God in contradistinction to the finite, contingent being of the created order. Nonetheless, the division of being is also marked by an affirmation of likeness between the two orders of being, a similarity which is grounded in the image of God displayed in creation, particularly as it is reflected in humanity. The way of expressing the mystery of God as infinitely-dissimilar-to-creation is usually negotiated by way of ‘negation of affirmation,’ the delimiting of cataphatic theology by means of the via negativa of apophatic theology. The problem, however, is that this approach is unable to account for a perduring similarity within the modal and ontological disjunction presented by the mystery of God’s mode of existence. Apophatic theology tends towards equivocation, risking incoherence of theological language and thus undermines God’s self-revelation. Cataphatic theology in turn constitutes univocal signification and results in the objectification of the divine. According to Gregory of Nyssa only a theology by way of analogy can adequately account for an ever greater dissimilarity without concomitant collapse of similarity. By way of a brief exploration of the deficiencies in apophasis and cataphasis, I aim to demonstrate that analogical theology is able to overcome the problematic inherent in simple apophatic and cataphatic theology. Only analogy can reflect the infinite mystery of God; it alone can rightly express and inform the inner spiritual tradition of Orthodoxy.
Studia Traditionis Theologiae
Analogical Identities: The Creation of the Christian Self
2019 •
Nikolaos Loudovikos
The Nature of Theological Language - Metaphor and Analogy.doc
David Cavanagh
An early undergraduate piece dealing with the extent to which theological language is metaphorical. This draws on concepts of divine transcendence and immanence, creation, the imago dei and the incarnation. Biblical materials used to illustrate the argument are the narratives of creation and the tower of Babel, Job, Ezekiel's merkabah vision and the Johannine call to brotherly love (1 John 4:7-12)
The Thomist
Review of: Bernard Montagnes, The Doctrine of the Analogy of Being according to Thomas Aquinas, trans. by E.M. Macierowski (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2004).
2008 •
Joshua Hochschild
Review of the English translation of Bernard Montagnes' influential 1963 monograph on analogy in Aquinas. (Pre-publication copy -- final version appeared in the Thomist in 2008.)
Analogical Identities: The Creation of the Christian Self by Nikolaos Loudovikos. St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 67 (2023), 215-23.
David Bradshaw
